Is Zodiark evil?

While we don't know if Zodiark himself is evil... everyone who claims to work for him really doesn't like the world as it currently is working and is actively working to change that. And from the looks of things, they don't care about what happens to all of the life that is currently living in the world.

The people who work for Hydaelyn meanwhile care a lot about the world and what happens to the people in it. They want them to have as much agency as possible and to not be bothered by the Ascians who are trying to wreck things.

So while that doesn't necessarily say that much about Zodiark or Hydaelyn, it does say a lot about the people who ally themselves with those entities. And one group of those people are a lot more evil then the other group is.

Until we get to talk to Zodiark himself, that's good enough for me. It's Zodiark's followers we interact with on a regular basis and not Zodiark himself as it is.

hydaelyn can say what she wants but untill we see and/or talk to zodiark im not taking her word for it especially as she is using minfillia as a puppet.

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Originally Posted by Kusanagi7

hydaelyn can say what she wants but untill we see and/or talk to zodiark im not taking her word for it especially as she is using minfillia as a puppet.

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It was always Minfillia's choice through and through to serve Hydaelyn.

this reminds me of a series of scenes in the Wheel of time... Throughout the series it is taught that the "Dark one" like Zodiark is evil. We see a couple of scenes one where light prevails, but is no "life" to the people. They have no free will and only do the 'good' and then one where the Dark one prevails where evil and pain is rife. It leads Rand Al'thor to realise that the dark one was never evil, he was never an enemy, he was simply a representation of the carnal part of our natures and by banishing one or the other, would rob life of its will to choose.

I think that this is probably the same dynamic that Hydaelyn and Zodiark offer, there is still free choice because Zodiark is banished rather than destroyed. But effectively what needs to happen is not the absolute of the light or Darkness but a balance of the both. Elidibus represents this pretty well i would say, in earlier appearances.

The other parallel that WOT has is in that all the things the Dark one's minions did, all the evil they propagated was by their choice and never as a direct consequence of what the Dark one wanted. I wonder whether this is true of the Ascians also. Either way its a very interesting concept.

My personal hope is that Zodiark turns out to represent darkness, but is merely the counter to light as umbral is to astral an that Hydealyn is actually evil in her desire to suppress the darkness and cause the source and the shards to have an over abundance of light rather than the natural balance that should exist.

Referring to the most recent information, I find it difficult to believe "light" is all good, considering we're apparently going to be fighting "Sin Eaters" which I believe are the polar opposite of "Void Sent" that we have fought here and there so far.

Then there's "Innocence" which is apparently going to be a boss of some sort. While I'm unsure if Sin Eaters and Void Sent are independent of Hydaelyn and Zodiark, I think it's at least safe to say Light and Darkness are not "good" and "evil".

Hopefully we get to have some heart to heart with Zodiark in Shadowbringers like we've done with Hydaelyn. I don't think we can really come to any kind of a conclusion before then.

Correct me if im wrong but isnt Hydaelyn responsible for the influx of light pretty much screwed up the world we are going to?

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Originally Posted by IkaraGreydancer

Correct me if im wrong but isnt Hydaelyn responsible for the influx of light pretty much screwed up the world we are going to?

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No, that was the Warriors of Darkness. You can indirectly blame her, since they were fighting for her sake, but Hydaelyn's thing has always been granting agency to her children, to let them act as they will for what they think is best. Not to mention how weak she's gotten, how little power she has to act directly. She's hardly puppet-mastering the situation. It's why she sent Minfillia to the First: she failed to give proper guidance because of her weakness, so she gave them more direct assistance.

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Originally Posted by RenewalXVII

No, that was the Warriors of Darkness. You can indirectly blame her, since they were fighting for her sake, but Hydaelyn's thing has always been granting agency to her children, to let them act as they will for what they think is best. Not to mention how weak she's gotten, how little power she has to act directly. She's hardly puppet-mastering the situation. It's why she sent Minfillia to the First: she failed to give proper guidance because of her weakness, so she gave them more direct assistance.

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Hmmm. Id say that makes alot of sense. My only question then would be, if she knew about how the First ended up why didnt she warn us earlier to keep the balance? Seems really odd that she'd "forget" or choose not to let us know that this is a possible outcome if we tip the scales to much in lights favor.
(Unless once again, she did warn us and I dont remember lol)

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Originally Posted by IkaraGreydancer

Correct me if im wrong but isnt Hydaelyn responsible for the influx of light pretty much screwed up the world we are going to?

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Not directly.

She provided the Echo to the Warriors of Light on the first. But it was a case of them besting Primals too often that kept tilting the world towards the light, until it became too much and caused the flood.

That is, as far as we know.

Given that the same thing has been happening on the Source since as far back as when the Allagans were still around and we're only now seeing some effects of being tilted towards light (As a result of the light on the First seeping into our world) it's possible that the actual cause of the Flood of Light might have been something intentional. Such as how the Flood of Darkness that consumed the Thirteenth was due to an Ascian's involvement trying to speed up the process of the Rejoining (Which then backfired and consumed the world...)

We'll have to see what the Shadowbringers story reveals. But suffice to say, Hydaelyn is not responsible for the Light.

From what we have seen in the game so far, Hydaelyn does not control and is not the source of Light and Zodiark does not control and is not the source of Darkness. What the Warrior of Light and the Ascians do does directly "cause" Light or Darkness to have more influence or become stronger. From the looks of things as they currently are, I'd say it's more a coincidence that Hydaelyn is on the "side" of Light and Zodiark is on the "side" of Darkness.

However, this seems to be what the expansion is going to be about mainly, so hopefully it will all get straightened out.